


The Great Prank Wars

by orphan_account



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Fun, Gen, Hogwarts Sixth Year, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Prank Wars, Pranks and Practical Jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:34:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,161
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24780901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The exams had finally ended, and with that came the most awaited event of the year for the Marauders. The Great Prank Wars.
Relationships: Alice Longbottom & Mary MacDonald & Marlene McKinnon & Dorcas Meadowes & Lily Evans Potter, Sirius Black & Remus Lupin & Peter Pettigrew & James Potter
Kudos: 7





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was written only because I needed something light in my life. It's not the best piece of literature, but it made me laugh a bit. I hope it brings you some joy as well!

The exams had finally ended, and with that came the most awaited event of the year for the Marauders. The Great Prank Wars.

Every year, they had a competition between them after finishing the exams to see who the best prankster among them was. Nothing was off-limits, as long as it did not cause any permanent harm or was considered to violate their rights, and they were only allowed to prank each other. This, of course, had caused the school to see each of them in varied embarrassing circumstances over the years. As their tradition came to be known by the rest of the school, bets were made on who would win that year, and many sickles were traded at the end of the year in consequence.

James and Remus were so far tied with two wins each. Sirius had never managed to win, to his utter dismay, and Peter had won last year when he somehow managed to convince them he was responsible for pranks he had never pulled off. This led to a big debate in the Mauraders’ Assembly, but they eventually agreed that, although they did not fully approve of his methods, it was to be considered a prank in itself, and as such, Peter had officially outpranked them all that year.

“You’ll see”, Sirius was telling them by the lake on the last afternoon of peace before the Wars started, “this will be my year. I can feel it.” They all laughed.

“You say that every year, Sirius, what makes you think this time you’ll be right?”, Remus asked, amused.

“I know all your ways by now. I can only win.”

“Yes, because you’ve been steadily studying our ways for the last 5 years through losing, right?”

James still had his smirk plastered when Sirius threw him on the lake, falling in with him, laughing.

* * *

“Girls, I have a proposal for you”, Lily started at the girls’ dorm.

“Oh, Lily, I thought you’d never ask”, said Mary with mockingly dreamy eyes. “Yes, of course, I’ll marry you!”

“Not yet, Mary my dear. I’m sorry, but you know I’m still waiting for my prince charming riding a hippogriff. If I haven’t found him by the time I’m 30, I’ll take you up on that offer.” Mary mumbled something that sounded a lot like _tell James Potter to buy a hippogriff_ , but Lily carried on, although her cheeks were a shade pinker. “You know how every year the boys go silly at the end of the year with all those pranks? Well, I say we sabotage them this year, by pranking _them_.”

“But Lily, I thought you didn’t like the Prank Wars… You complain about them every year”, Alice said.

“Well, yeah, but that’s just another reason to do this. To give them a taste of their own remedy, and maybe they’ll come to their senses and stop pranking everyone. Besides, we also deserve some fun! Next year will be our last and we’ll be too sentimental and worrying about N.E.W.T.S. for this. We ought to have some fun while we can!”

“I’m in!”, Mary said with a huge grin on her face.

“Me too”, said Marlene. “If only to prevent Black from winning. I swear his dramatic antics after he loses every year are only getting funnier. I think that’s what I like the most about this whole ordeal.”

“Sure, let’s do this”, agreed Dorcas, also smiling.

“Okay, fine”, Alice said. “But how are we going to do this?”

“Oh, I have a few ideas”, Lily said, grinning mischievously.


	2. Chapter 2

_“The first step is to confuse them. We’ll throw so many small pranks at them that they won’t know for sure who did them. Not too big, just big enough to be noticed. Remember: confuse, not abuse. One of them will probably try and take credit, but we’ll keep a record of our own if we need to show them in the end. After all, we’re not doing this so Peter can win again.”_

* * *

The next morning, the girls came down to breakfast early, so they arrived before the boys. It was time for their first prank.

They were enjoying their toasts when the boys came down, sitting next to them as expected. It had become usual to see all sixth year Gryffindors eating together after Lily and James had finally managed to start speaking cordially to each other. The two of them now usually sat rather close and spoke more warmly than cordially, but no one said anything. That was a whole other bet going on.

“Good morning, girls.”

“Morning”.

They sat down and started putting butter and jam on their toasts as well. However, to their surprise and the despair of their empty stomachs, each time any of them brought the toast close to their mouth, it would immediately fall back on the plate.

“What the…? Which one of you did this? You know breakfast is the most important meal of the day, you should leave it out of the Pranks!”, Peter complained.

“Don’t look at me!”, Remus said. “It’s happening to me as well. And you know I’m not one to waste food, I wouldn’t do this.”

“Evans, would you be kind enough to help me eat? Your toasts don’t seem to have any trouble fighting gravity”, James said, smirking at her.

Lily let out a disbelieving grunt before answering. “Really? Again with this stupid Prank Wars? And don’t tell me you did this yourself just so you could ask me to feed you on the mouth, Potter.”

“That depends… Is it working?”

“No”, Lily answered flatly, but struggling to keep her lips from curling upwards.

“Well then no, it wasn’t me. But please, will you feed me? You wouldn’t let a gentleman starve.” James looked at her with his best impression of puppy eyes.

“Why don’t you follow Peter’s lead? He seems to be managing not to starve on his own”, Lily answered.

They all looked at Peter, who had decided he did not need his hands to eat. If the food didn’t come to his mouth, his mouth would come to the food. Indeed, his whole face was full of jam, now, but he _was_ eating.

They laughed at that sight.

* * *

The next time they were all together that day, a lot of pranks had obviously happened. The girls had decided to “divide and conquer” after breakfast, so each of them went around alone, playing the pranks without the boys noticing. If they were always together when the pranks happened, they would probably be discovered sooner. Besides, the boys had also split up, so it was easier to target them that way.

So far, the boys’ uniforms had all shrank in varying ways. Sirius’ pants could now only be considered shorts. Remus was trying his best not to show his belly button but failing miserably (though he did not seem to mind it as much when a certain someone blushed after seeing his stomach). James’ sleeves now ended right before his elbows (Lily didn’t see how that was as inconvenient as the other changes but couldn’t say she wasn’t pleased with what Mary had done there). Peter seemed to have discarded his shoes completely after realizing they didn’t fit him anymore. As a consequence of walking barefoot while being chubby, he somewhat resembled a hobbit, and one of them had decided to give him the hairy feet to go with the look.

Sirius’ tie was now multicolored instead of having only the Gryffindor colors, but that could have been his doing and not a prank. In fact, he seemed quite proud to wear it like that.

Peter’s shirt had a little brown vest charmed on it. Honestly, someone should just give him a pipe and he’d be full-on Bilbo Baggins.

Remus and James seemed to have traded hairstyles: Remus now had messy sandy hair and James had dark curls. It was… odd. Alice giggled at that, but never took credit for it.

All in all, they were an even more bizarre group than they usually were.

“Alright, boys, time for a little truce?”, Mary asked.

“Definitely! It’s snack time!”, Peter answered cheerfully and showed them a packet of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans. Or so he thought. Marlene had left breakfast early, snuck into their dorm, and swapped all their beans with regular Muggle jellybeans, courtesy of Lily.

“Sweet! Give me one!”, Dorcas asked and immediately ate one, talking while chewing. “Let’s see. It’s… plain sugar? Is that a new flavor?”

“I don’t think so… Are you sure it isn’t some fruit?”, Peter asked.

“I’m pretty sure I know what fruit tastes like, Peter, and this ain’t it”, she said.

“Throw me one, Pete”, Sirius called. He ate it and threw a confused look at Dorcas. “You’re right, this one also tastes like sugar. Are you sure they’re not past their expiry date, Peter?”

“No way, I got them last time we went to Hogsmeade!” He ate a few jellybeans, getting gloomier with each one. “Come on, guys… You’ve messed with my snacks? When are you going to understand this? Mealtime. Is. Sacred. You ought not to mess with it. First breakfast, then at lunch one of you managed to shrink all my food, and now this? Am I not allowed to eat anymore?”

They all laughed at the miserable expression he had.

“I don’t know, Pete, maybe you could take this as a chance to finally start your diet! Although I don’t think sugar jellybeans are healthier than earwax beans”, James said.

Peter glared at him, and everyone just laughed harder.

* * *

“So, how’s the count?”, Mary asked later that night in the common room.

“Well, so far it’s like this”, James said, pulling a piece of parchment from his bag. “I’m winning with one more prank than Remus, then there’s Peter, and, drumroll, please, Sirius is last!” Sirius punched him in the arm, but they were laughing. “There’s also a few unclaimed pranks so far, but unlike last year, we’ll require evidence before counting them”, he said with a side glance at Peter, who didn’t seem to notice.

_Perfect_ , Lily thought to herself. In fact, they’d been taking pictures documenting their every prank. It would be quite the collage before the end of the week.

They spent the rest of the night playing games and chatting happily, for a few moments forgetting about everything else.


	3. Chapter 3

_“You know how they’re always messing with Sirius because he acts like a dog?”, Dorcas asked. “We should give him a tail!”_

_“Oh, that would be hilarious!”, Marlene said. “I can already imagine him wagging his tail when he’s happy.”_

* * *

The next morning, Lily woke up extra early to sneak into the boys’ dorm and give Sirius his new tail. They’d been practicing last night, and hers was the best tail. The girls had decided that if he were a dog, he’d be a black chihuahua, so they were going for a black tail. They knew the counter-spell, of course. The purpose was not to _actually_ turn him into a dog (“ _Can you imagine, a dog at Hogwarts?”_ , Alice had asked last night), it was just for fun. They’d turn him back before breakfast, after what they guessed would be a few moments of confusion and laughing around.

Lily didn’t have an invisibility cloak, which she thought would be extremely useful for this kind of situation, but she knew how to move around unnoticed. She opened the door just slightly and peered inside, confirming they were all still asleep. They’d been to the boys’ dorm a few times before, for evenings of games and banter, so she knew Sirius’ bed was right across the room, close to the window. She crawled there, careful not to wake anyone up, and when she was close enough, she cast the spell. She could not see the tail, but she saw a mass under the blanket that wasn’t there before and thought that was as good a confirmation as she would get, for the time being. She crawled back out of the dorm and went to her room, to hopefully sleep a bit more before they gathered in the common room, waiting for the boys before breakfast.

* * *

Remus woke up with a tail wagging against his thigh.

“What the…? Sirius, I’ve told not to turn into Padfoot in the dorm! You get fur all over the place”, he complained, with his eyes still closed.

“What are you talking about?”, Sirius asked.

Remus opened his eyes immediately. Sirius could not speak as Padfoot, but the fur he was feeling against him was distinctly not human. He looked down to see a black tail coming out from Sirius’ lower back and screamed.

Which obviously woke up the other two boys.

“What’s going on? What time is it?”, James grumbled, feeling around for his glasses.

When he finally found them, he saw both Remus and Sirius looking at Sirius’ tail. _No, Sirius doesn’t have a tail. Padfoot has a tail. Sirius is human. That cannot be a tail._ Except that… it was.

“Sirius… What’s happened? How do you have a tail?”

“You tell me!”, he answered hysterically. “Did any of you do this? Is this one your pranks? Turn me back!” His voice was getting shriller with each word, and if he did not stop, probably only, well, dogs would be able to hear his high-pitched demands.

“I didn’t do it”, James said and looked at the other two Marauders.

“Me neither”, said Remus. “I don’t think anyone would connect the dots, but I wouldn’t risk you guys exposing your Animagus forms for some prank.”

“I can’t even imagine what spell does that, so it definitely wasn’t me”, Peter said.

They all sat in silence for a while, trying to think of an explanation.

“Maybe”, James started, “you turned into Padfoot on your sleep and something went wrong when turning back?”

Sirius looked at him as if he was stupid. “Have you ever woken up a stag, James? I know the light is bright and you look in the morning as a deer in front of car lights, but I’ve never seen you spurting antlers out of nowhere.”

“Okay, okay, it was only a suggestion!”

“Maybe you could try turning into Padfoot and back again, though, and see if it disappeared?”, Peter suggested.

This led to a big argument, because _What if there’s really something wrong with my Animagus and I can’t change back?_ , but _Well, it’s not going away on its own!_ and _Anyway, you’re always happy as a dog, we’ll buy you those bone-shaped treats till we find a way to cure you._

In the end, Sirius resigned and turned into his Animagus form. Except the result was not at all what they had expected. Padfoot now had two tails instead of one!

“Now, that’s just wrong, mate, dogs shouldn’t have two tails”, Peter said, crunching his face in distaste.

“But you’re okay with a human having one?”, Remus asked him.

“I don’t know! Maybe he’ll find some use to it. But that just looks wrong to me.”

Sirius had enough of that conversation and shifted back to himself which, to his consternation, still had a tail.

“Wait, turn back”, James said.

“What? So you can talk about all the usefulness of having a tail? I’ll give you mine if you want it!”

James dismissed him with his hand. “No, you git, I think I noticed something. Turn back.”

As soon as he shifted, James approached his tails. Remus saw what he was doing and did the same, feeling each of them with his hand. They shared a look and instructed Sirius to turn back again.

“What is it?”, he asked, more unnerved than before.

“You have your usual shaggy tail. And you have another tail, but fluffier. Like the one you have now. So that’s not your tail. It’s not a part of Padfoot”, Remus told him.

“And you’re basing this on degrees of fluffiness?”, Sirius asked, rolling his eyes.

Remus looked him in the eye before saying, “I think I’m quite familiar with your _tail_ by now to say that one is not yours.”

Sirius blushed a bit at that but eventually agreed.

“So, if this isn’t a remain of my Animagus form, and it’s not one of your pranks, what does it mean?”, he asked.

They all seemed to think for a while before Remus slowly spoke.

“It means… Someone else is messing with us...”

“Who?”, Peter asked. “Some Slytherin taking revenge?”

“No, that doesn’t make sense. They couldn’t come to our dorm and do this… It needs to be someone from the inside.”

They all looked at each other before reaching the same conclusion. It was Sirius who eloquently voiced it.

“The traitorous minxes!”

* * *

After two hours of waiting for the boys without them coming down, the girls gave in to their stomachs and went for breakfast. Sirius would have to keep his tail until they next saw him.


	4. Chapter 4

“So, what do we do now?”, Peter asked, dropping food on one of their beds.

They’d decided to stay in the dorm until they figured out their next step, so Peter had gone to the kitchens under the invisibility cloak to bring them food. He seemed to think they would be staying there for a week, judging for the number of pastries he brought.

“Well… As I see it, we can either confront them, or we can start pranking them back.”, James said. “But that probably means we need to cancel the Prank Wars.”

“If we cancel after one day, you’ll not be considered victor this year, Prongs, don’t even try it”, Sirius said, pointing menacingly at him with a piece of toast.

“There’s another issue”, Peter chimed in before they started arguing and lost track of the matter. “Do you think they know anything about Sirius being an Animagus? If not, why the tail?”

“I don’t think they do”, Remus said. “The tail is really well made. It has a movement of its own, the fur is shiny, it’s almost lifelike.”

“Your point being?”, Sirius asked, surprised that he could be jealous of his own tail. Or the tail that he currently had. Was it his own? Could he claim ownership to a tail he didn’t grow himself? It was attached to him, anyway… Not that he’d had any say in the matter.

“My point being”, Remus answered, confused with Sirius’ tone of voice, “it’s really good wand work. If it was one of the girls, it was probably Lily. She’s the best of them at Charms and Transfiguration.”

Remus’ train of thought was interrupted by a disgruntled sound coming from James, and they all turned to look at him.

“What’s the matter with you, Prongs?”, Sirius asked after seeing how red James had turned.

“I mean… Lily was in our dorm while we were sleeping… to pull a prank… which she did perfectly… I’m equal parts proud, turned on, and feeling violated.”

They all looked at him like he was making no sense.

“I’m going to choose to ignore you just said that disturbing combination of words, and will instead move on with my point”, Remus said after a few moments. “So, Lily knows about me being a werewolf. If she knew you were Animagus, she would probably connect the dots and understand you somehow did it for me. She’s a smart gal. And since she never burst in here screaming and threatening all of us because you’re risking your lives every month (and you know I’d agree with her, by the way), I’m gonna risk it and say she doesn’t know about it. And even if she did and had somehow managed to fight the urge of telling us how stupid we all were for it, she wouldn’t have gone with the prank, lest the other girls found out.”

“Wait, Lily knows you’re a werewolf?”, Peter asked nervously.

“Yeah, I mean, I think she does. Ever since last year, she always offers to switch turns with me when my prefect rounds happen to be on the full moon. We never openly spoke about it, but I’m pretty sure she knows and is alright with it. Never got the courage to ask her about it, though...”

“There it is again”, James spoke, more to himself than anything, “that mix of pride and turned on… How uncanny…”

“Okay, James, we love you, and we’ll get to your bad ways of coping with your feelings another time, but right now we have more pressing matters”, Peter told him.

“Like what?”, Sirius asked.

“Like you tail!”, Peter answered, gesturing widely to the object of discussion.

“Oh, right. I forgot. I think I could get used to it. It’s not that bothersome.”

“Remind me, why do I love you, again?”, Remus asked, sounding tired.

“Because of my charming good looks and amazing wits”, Sirius answered with a grin and wiggled his eyebrows and tail at the same time.

“No, that ain’t it”, Remus said but was smiling affectionately at the other boy.

“Anyway”, said Peter, trying once again to keep them focused, “the tail has to go. Bothersome or not, it's bound to raise some questions.”

“And what do you suggest?”, James asked him.

“We could shave it. Or cut it off.”

“No way!”, Sirius said with fear in his voice. “Cut your own tail off.” He was indeed clutching to his tail like it was a pet they were talking about killing.

“I don’t have a tail, Sirius”, Peter answered slowly, as if he was explaining this to a child. “That’s the whole point.”

“We could ask Lily to change it back. She probably knows how to do it”, James said.

“We can’t just _ask_ her. That means they won”, Sirius said. “I could try to hide it. Maybe I can put it under my clothes in a way people won’t notice. That would confuse them. And would give us time to get back at them.”

They went like that for a while more. Remus suggested they at least try to shrink it so it would be easier to hide, but Sirius was having none of that. He was afraid tampering with it would prevent the girls from casting the counterspell and he would end up with a permanent tail.

Eventually, they decided he would hide it for the day they’d play some pranks on the girls without them noticing. First, they would have some fun. Then, they would confront them, and Sirius would say goodbye to his new tail.


	5. Chapter 5

“Do you think the boys are alright? We still haven’t seen them today”, Alice asked.

In fact, after breakfast the girls had gone up to the common room, only to find out the boys still hadn’t left their dorm. Eventually, they decided to go enjoy the morning sun by the lake, instead of waiting all morning for them.

“They probably just overslept. It wouldn’t be the first time they only got out of the dorm after noon”, Mary said. She was the least concerned of them by the boy’s absence. She was quite certain they would appear any time, laughing about Sirius’ tail.

Lily, on the other hand, was getting more unnerved by the second.

“What if I did something wrong with the spell? What if they’re panicking because of the tail? What if I hurt him? I should go ask Madam Pomfrey if they’ve been there!”, Lily said, jumping to her feet. If it weren’t for Dorcas grabbing her sleeve, she would be off before any of them could say anything.

“Lily, calm down. You tried the spell a hundred times, yesterday, so I’m sure it went perfectly. Besides, I’m pretty sure they figured it was just some prank and are arguing about who did it or how to turn it back. I mean, they aren’t exactly known for practicing the counterspells to their pranks. Why do you think Madam Pomfrey is so familiar with them?”

Lily didn’t seem at all convinced.

“We should at least have done it while we were all together, so we could confirm it did not harm him…”, she mumbled.

“We discussed that last night, Lily”, Marlene told her, “and decided that it would be too obvious it was us who did it that way. Besides, the plan was for them to come down laughing about it so we could turn it back, arguing with your knowledge of healing magic. Not for them to hide all morning.”

“Don’t worry, Lils”, Mary said. She was more serious now, so Lily listened to what she had to say. “They’ll come down any minute, and you’ll get rid of the tail. But we all know you’re great with your spells, and I’m sure you did nothing wrong. Dorcas is right, they’re probably just panicking or trying to cure it themselves. And probably making a mess out of it”, she ended the soothing speech laughing, which probably didn’t help Lily’s nerves, but she didn’t seem so keen on running to Madam Pomfrey anymore.

“Okay, okay. But let’s maybe go inside and check on them? It’s almost time for lunch, anyway”, she said.

They all agreed and started walking towards the castle. They were talking happily about their plans for summer, and almost reaching the castle when Lily suddenly stopped.

“What the…?”

“Lily, is everything alright? Why have you stopped?”, Alice asked.

“I can’t…”, she started saying, while pulling on her feet. She seemed stuck and couldn’t manage to take her feet off the ground. She pulled a little more forcefully, and as suddenly as she was glued to the ground, she was free, which caused her to stumble with the force she was pulling on her feet. She looked around and saw a glimpse of black hair trying to hide behind a column.

“Oh, that tail is only getting bigger”, she whispered, narrowing her eyes.

* * *

“What was that, Black?”, Remus angrily asked Sirius as soon as the girls were out of earshot.

After they had decided they would play their share of pranks on the girls before confronting them, they had come down to find them. Sure enough, they were enjoying the sun by the lake. No one studied harder than Lily, except maybe for Remus, but as soon as she was exam-free she rightfully indulged in the sweet art of doing nothing. The other girls, of course, were happy to oblige. It was nice to be pulled into the sun instead of the library, and they knew better than anyone how fun a stress-free Lily could be.

So, going to the lake to find them was a winning bet.

They had gotten there when they seemed to be deciding to go back into the castle. So, the boys hid behind the columns of the courtyard. But. of course, Sirius had decided to do something.

“It was a prank!”, he said, trying to defend himself from the accusatory glare Remus was giving him.

“A terrible prank! You almost gave us away, and you only managed to bother her slightly. Marlene and Dorcas didn’t even realize she had stopped!”

“Mate, you’re a great executor of pranks”, James intervened, “but you’re shite at planning them. You should know that by now. Just leave the planning to the master pranksters and follow along.”

“Yeah, just follow along”, Peter taunted, grinning.

“You won once, Peter. For pranks you did not pull. Everyone knows you’re the lookout, anyway, not the planner, so don’t even try it”, Sirius said between his teeth.

“It’s still one more win than you have…”, Peter whispered, but loud enough to match his grin.

Sirius looked at him like he was deciding the best way to torture him, so James decided to cut in.

“Okay, lads, moving on”, he said. “The girls have gone inside. What’s our next step?”

They all looked to Remus. Despite all their bickering about it, they all knew Remus was the master planner behind most of their pranks. If they wanted something perfectly timed and executed, they needed to turn to him.

“It’s almost noon. I say we go have some lunch. Let’s confuse them about the whereabouts of Sirius’s tail. Then we’ll unleash chaos.”

* * *

After entering the castle, Lily had ushered the other girls in an empty classroom, instead of going for the Great Hall.

“They know”, she told them in the gravest tone.

“Who knows? Know what?”

“They know we’re the ones who gave Sirius his tail. And they probably did the math and know we did all these pranks yesterday too.”

Lily explained what happened in the courtyard. Marlene and Dorcas were so entranced in their own conversation they didn’t even notice Lily had stopped moving for a while. She then told them about the glimpse she saw, and about how it was most likely Sirius who had done it in revenge.

“What do we do now, then?”, Marlene asked. “Do we confess to everything?”

“No”, Alice answered, in the most decisive tone they had heard from her since this all started. They all turned to her. “They could have confronted us, and we would just laugh about it. They decided to play dirty. We need to play dirtier.”

“Oh, Alice, I love you like this”, Mary said, her eyes shining. For while Alice was usually a calm girl, she could be ruthless.

They debated their next steps for a while and decided to go to lunch at once. They didn’t want the boys to think they were hiding, after all.


	6. Chapter 6

The girls arrived at the lunch table after the boys and, as planned, decided to play as if nothing had happened.

“Decided to sleep in today, uh?”, Dorcas asked them with a small smile. “We waited for you a bit on the common room, to see if you wanted to hang by the lake, but our stomachs were stronger than our willingness to wait for you, so we came for breakfast instead.”

“Uh, yeah, slept in, that’s what we did”, Peter mumbled. He was really confused about the lack of reactions from the girls. None of them even cast a glance at Sirius's bottom. He would expect them to at least try to check him out for a tail. But they didn’t even seem to acknowledge there could be something interesting hidden under Sirius’s pants.

He received a kick on his leg and realized he’d been staring at the girls. He quickly moved his focus to the food on the table.

The girls started eating as well, and the boys didn’t notice how they only ate something after one of them had already served himself from the same platter. They didn’t put it past the boys to try and put some weird potion on their food. Better safe than sorry. Even if that meant no potatoes for them.

“Say, does any of you have a dog?”, James asked after some nice, superficial talk. While he had hidden it better than Peter, he too was shocked by the girls’ lack of reaction and was determined to get one out of them. “Parents have been talking about getting one this summer.”

“Oh, I love dogs!”, Mary exclaimed, looking as innocent and honest as ever. “Particularly black chihuahuas, they have such nice, fluffy tails”, she said, motioning with her hands as if she was stroking a pet. Sirius choked on his food and was saved by Remus clapping him on the back.

Marlene proceeded as if the conversation had not been interrupted.

“But you have a big backyard, don’t you? Maybe you should adopt a big dog and let him play in all that free space.”

“Or many tiny dogs”, Dorcas added, laughing.

James didn’t really want to discuss dogs and wasn’t sure what to make out of their answers. Were they messing with him, or did they genuinely like dogs? Well, probably both.

He didn’t wonder for long, though. The girls seemed to have finished their lunch and were standing, getting ready to leave. Before they did, though, Lily cast them a meaningful glance and said, in what would be considered a lovely voice if they didn’t know better:

“Beware of the courtyard, if you go outside. The floor is rather sticky today.”

_Oh, they knew._

* * *

The afternoon went by with a tense atmosphere. The boys knew. The girls knew the boys knew. And the boys knew the girls knew the boys knew. So where did that leave them? Who would pull the first move? They were all moving wearily around the castle, alert for anything suspicious.

Eventually, it was the boys who moved first.

The girls had decided they would not spend their last days hiding in the castle. So, they went outside. By the lake. Where they knew the boys would easily find them. And would no doubt try to do something.

At first, they merely sat beside them, seemingly non-threatening. So much so that Lily was almost embarrassed about keeping her wand on her hand. Almost.

Suddenly, something started moving on the lake in their direction. Sure enough, Sirius was grinning. The boy _was_ smart but couldn’t keep from giving himself away. Lily wondered if he even knew he was grinning.

“What’s that moving on the lake?”, James asked, rivaling Mary in his (false) display of innocence.

Lily looked at him with a mix of wonder and mischievousness. “Do you think the giant squid is finally coming to ask me on a date? I mean, I think I owe them one, don’t you think, James?”

“Maybe after you go out with the giant squid, you’ll realize I’m not that bad after all”, he answered. It was not the best comeback, and he knew it, but he was caught off-guard with that answer and he needed to keep them distracted. Peter elbowed him, grinning.

“You’re absolutely right, James my boy”, he said. “The way to any girl’s heart is to make them lower their standards. Way to go.” And they all started laughing. Even James, who reckoned how ridiculous that sounded.

The _thing_ approached them while they were all laughing, and the boys thought they had won this round. But Lily had been looking out and soon noticed that the thing was only a big mass of water, aiming specifically at the girls. _Amateurs,_ she thought. She waited until the wave had almost reached the lakeshore, and with a swift movement of her wand deflected it, sending it right into the boys. She realized too late that both Alice and Marlene had done the same, so they sent it with such a combined force that the boys went tumbling to the ground. _Oops_.

“You boys alright?”, Mary asked with mocking concern.

* * *

“Well, that didn’t backfire at all, Moons”, Sirius complained when they went up to the dorms to change into some dry clothes.

“I’m sorry! We usually plan pranks against unsuspecting victims. I forgot they would be on the lookout for anything we tried”, Remus said. He was the one who got most of the water, which only added to his gloom mood. Failed prank and wet to the bones. Way to go indeed.

They had reached the common room and were turning to get to their dorm when Sirius stopped short.

“What is it, Sirius?”

“I have an idea”, he said, looking at the stairs which led to the girls’ dorm.

* * *

The rest of the day went more or less like that. The boys tried to pull a prank. Sometimes they managed to pull it off. Most of the time one of the girls caught them and deflected it one way or another. The same happened when the girls tried to pull a prank. That went back and forth until they all had at least one piece of clothing that was just not quite right, most of them had fallen or at least tripped somewhere during the day, and they barely ate at dinner, afraid of what the others would do.

Yet they never acknowledge what was going on. None of them wanted to be the first to break and confront the other group about what they had been doing. And none of them wanted to openly admit they had been pranked. Which led to many interesting interactions to anyone observing from the outside.

Remus fell when they were approaching the girls, obviously tripped by some jinx. He simply sat on the spot and started talking from there. Never mind he was still about 2 meters from the girls.

Mary’s skirt was suddenly 10 centimeters shorter. She merely spun around and asked “By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask you guys. What do you think of my new skirt? Is it too much?”

Peter’s snack disappeared in the air right before his mouth. “You know what? I’m not that hungry”.

Dorcas's hair turned bright pink in a blink of an eye. No one commented. (Later, she would admit that she actually enjoyed it, and was considering dyeing it that color)

And on and on and on.

Eventually, they went up to the common room, and the girls called it a night, going up to their dorm.

Or so they thought. As soon as they got there, they noticed someone had turned their dorm upside down. Quite literally. Their beds were somehow glued to the ceiling.

“Oh hell no”, Lily snapped. “I’m way too tired for this. Girls, get your stuff.”

Next thing the boys knew, the girls were crossing the common room again, armed with a pillow and a vanity bag, trudging towards their dorm.

“What are you doing?”, Peter asked. The others were too shocked by the girls’ nerves to do anything other than stare.

Only when they had reached the stairs and were sure the boys couldn’t outrun them, did Lily turn around and say, with the sweetest voice she could muster, “Our beds seemed to find today was the day they should defy gravity. Wonder how that happened. Anyway, we’re taking over your beds for the night. You can either sleep here on the couches or use our dorm. It’s empty. Good night.”

At that, the girls all went to the boys’ dorm and locked the door from the inside, preventing them from coming in.


	7. Chapter 7

Sirius woke up with the first rays of sunlight. They ended up sleeping in the common room, curled in armchairs by the fire. They didn’t even have their pajamas. The girls had managed to lock the door from the inside, and no amount of _Alohomoras_ managed to open it.

Before, they had gone to the girls' room from outside, flying to their window. But their brooms were in their dorm, and they couldn’t get past the stairs/slide to the girls’ dorm from inside. They had the bruises to prove they’d tried.

“Ugh, we can’t keep going on like this. It’s been dreadful”, Sirius groaned, voice still heavy with sleep.

“What did you say, Pads?”, James asked, groping around for his glasses.

“We need to confront the girls, get rid of this freaking tail, and have some freedom”, he answered.

“I thought you’d grown accustomed to your tail”, Peter teased him.

“I’ve since realized I have enough tails as it is”, he answered in a bitter tone. “Anyway, tomorrow is the last day of term, and I sort of can’t go home like this.”

“I’m sure Mom would be able to fix you if it came to that”, James said.

“I know she would, but… it’s embarrassing, I don’t want to go home sporting a tail because of a prank. And admit that I was too scared to try and fix it, or too proud to ask for the girls to undo it.”

“Actually”, Peter added, “I’m with Sirius on this one. I want to be able to enjoy our last meals at Hogwarts without worrying whether the food has been tampered with.”

“But what about the Prank Wars?”, James whined.

“But it’s not about the Wars, anymore, is it?”, Remus said, also tired. “It’s just all of us being too stubborn. Let’s just talk to the girls and enjoy our last days together.”

“Yeah, you’re right… Let’s see if they’re up yet?”

* * *

Lily woke up feeling misplaced. It took her a while to remember where she was and why she was there.

Taking over the boys’ dorm had seemed a good idea at first, but they soon realized that Sirius’s bed had way too much fur (had it all come from the tail they’d given him? In just one day?) and Peter’s had too many crumbles. So, they ended up sleeping three in James’s bed and two in Remus’s bed. Which was as uncomfortable as it sounds.

She groaned and tried to roll to her other side, only to fall on the floor. Yes, three people sleeping in a single bed was definitely not a good idea.

“Lils, y’okay?”, Mary grumbled.

“No”, Lily answered. She didn’t even try to get up from the ground where she lay.

“Can we call this off?”, Alice asked. “I miss my bed”

“Yeah, and I’m still hungry from last night’s dinner”, Marlene said. “This was fun at first, but I’m just tired now. If I wanted to be on constant vigilance, I’d just go on to be an Auror”.

“I know… Maybe we should just talk to the boys.”

They decided to tidy what they disheveled before going down and meet the boys.

* * *

The girls were leaving the dorm right when the boys were coming upstairs to meet them.

“Hey, uh, can we talk?”

“Yeah, I think we should.”

They went back to the room and sat in a circle on the floor. They admitted maybe they got a bit carried away and agreed they should just enjoy their last two days of term.

“So, we’ll take care of Sirius’s tail and you’ll take care of our dorm?”, Lily asked.

“Deal”, James answered.

“Also, whatever you did to get to our dorm… Can you not do that again? At least not without telling us. It sort of feels like an invasion of privacy”, Alice asked. The boys sheepishly agreed.

“Okay, one last thing to do then”, Mary said, back to her usual cheerful tone. Everyone looked at her expectantly. “Show us your tail! Let us see the product of our work!”

Everyone laughed when Sirius pulled off his tail and started wagging it against everyone’s faces.

* * *

“I’m just sorry we disappointed your fans”, Lily was telling James during lunch, in the Great Hall. “All those bets for nothing.”

“Actually…”, a fifth-year sitting close enough to hear them started awkwardly, “we kept the bets going on, but added the girls as a team. We decided they won.”

Sirius gaped at the boy for a while before dramatically clutching his chest and falling face-first in his place, while saying “I lost to the girls! On their first try! My heart can’t take it anymore! Goodbye, cruel world!”

They all broke down laughing.


End file.
